I Never Cry Anymore
by Sprints 100
Summary: I never cry anymore. Not that I don’t want to cry, or have no reason to cry. A better phrase, I suppose, would be that I can’t cry anymore. [One shot]


**Author's note**: Okay.. this is my first pathetic attempt at a fanfiction! I figured a one shot wouldn't be too hard. It turned out a lot more angsty than I had originally intended, but oh well.. can't help that. The narrator of this story is no newsie in particular... I wrote the story and I don't even know who it is. So I left it up to the reader to decide. If you'd care to review, I'd like to see who people think it could be... and tell me what you think of the story too, even if it sucks. Personally, I think it reads kind of choppy, but my two friends that read it liked it like that.. so the choppiness stays. I just hope it's not hard to read. Anyway.. enjoy!

Sprints

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Disclaimer**: Haha.. whoops... almost forgot this. I do not own Newsies. Hard to believe, right?

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I never cry anymore.

Not that I don't want to cry, or have no reason to cry. A better phrase, I suppose, would be that I _can't_ cry anymore.

Scratch that. All of it. Everything I just said. You see, I'm not saying it right. There _is_ no right way to say it, but if you insist, I suppose I'll try.

I cry, but I don't cry.

Am I confusing you yet? Of course I am. Stupid question, sorry. Let me try again. I'll start with an explanation, rather than a statement.

My theory, which I have begun to call it, is that a long time ago, when I used to cry like everyone else, I ran out of tears. Used up my quota. Cried myself dry. I couldn't cry anymore, but _I still had to cry_. How can one cry, when they can't shed a tear?

My body made up its own answer for that question. When I cry, which is more often than I'd like to admit, I don't shed any tears. I've long forgotten the taste, the smell, the feeling of my own tears. No… I don't "cry", as you know it to be. Instead, I get cold.

What do I mean by that, you ask? Just what I said. I get cold. I shiver. My teeth chatter. Sometimes, when I really break down, my lips turn blue. It's not any more glamorous than your regular crying, if that's what you imagined.

And it's not your regular winter weather cold that I feel, either. It comes from deep inside me, and I can't fix it with more blankets or warmer clothing. Just like you can't stop tears by simply wiping them away- they are always replaced by more. Except in my case, or course. It's a bone-chilling, mind-numbing cold, the freezing of my very heart and soul. And it's miserable. The "I'd rather be dead than go through this" kind of miserable. I'm jealous of others, who just deal with salty tears and splotchy faces. I tend to cry as little as possible, if I can help it, but it's still too much.

Funny… I keep calling what I do "crying", when really it's not crying at all. But it is. You see the dilemma I had earlier, trying to explain it to you? It confuses even me. What do you call what I do? No answer. Exactly. There isn't and never will be a word created for my "crying". "Crying" is just a substitute I must use, the closest description for people to understand. I can't just say I "get cold". How do you simply "get cold" in the middle of a scorching summer night? Ah… the confusion continues.

What do I have to cry about? An easy question for me to answer. Everything. My life, and everything in it. Or not in it. I cry about nothing different than what the other newsboys cry about. Yeah, that's right. The other boys cry. What, you think we're all invincible, that nothing can hurt us? Well, you're wrong. Our life isn't anything near "fine".

I hear them cry. The other boys. Someone almost every night. I'm a bit of a night owl, you see. I guess it has to do with the fact I'm often too cold to fall asleep. So I hear them. All of them. Some try to muffle the sobs, and cry quietly to themselves, others bawl freely. Still others aren't even awake when they cry. I've heard crying from every bunk, at least once, I'm sure. One night from the bunk to my left, the next night from the one above, the next from one across the room. I can identify the sobs of all my friends, though I'm not proud of the fact.

They all have reasons for their heart-wrenching tears. I would never be so bold as to ask them outright what those reasons are, so sometimes during those long, cold nights, I make up their stories. Explanations for their tears. He is crying about a lost love, he was beaten as a child. Stories in which they're always worse off than I am. It makes me feel better, in a twisted way.

Sometimes I wish I could help them. I've heard the most sorrowful, painful cries in my life. They make me wonder if it's possible to cry yourself to death. The guilt grows on you, you know, as you order yourself to get up, and ask them if they're okay. But you're afraid of the answer. That's what it's like for me every night.

They all realize I get cold at night; they don't think twice about that. We all get cold at night, but nobody's willing to give up their blankets for another. I suppose that's one good thing about me and my "crying". Nobody ever _hears_ me cry. To them, _I'm_ the invincible one. But that can also be a bad thing, when maybe you _want_ someone to hear.

And tonight, I want someone to hear.


End file.
